Gay-rights supporters on Tet parade sideline

Miniature lion dancer Nicholas Vu, 4, delights the crowd with his cuteness during the 2013 Tet parade in Westminster on Sunday. MINDY SCHAUER, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Thien Ai, 5, catches raindrops on her tongue as she gets ready to march in the Westminster Tet Parade on Sunday. MINDY SCHAUER, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Peaceful protesters hold signs at the annual Tet parade in Westminster on Sunday, where gays were not allowed to march in the lunar new year event. MINDY SCHAUER, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Lieng Mai, carries a giant American flag as she represents the Marines during the 2013 Tet parade in Westminster on Sunday. MINDY SCHAUER, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Marchers take part in the Tet parade Sunday where thousands attended the annual Westminster lunar new year celebration. Funding problems threatened the event but the show went on. MINDY SCHAUER, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Doan Mua Lan dancers entertain the crowd at the Tet parade in Westminster, where they welcomed the Year of the Snake on Sunday. MINDY SCHAUER, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Umbrellas decorate the Tet parade route in Westminster as a woman perches above to take pictures. MINDY SCHAUER, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Assemblyman Tom Daly, D-Anaheim, back to camera, offers support to a group protesting the exclusion of gays in Westminster's Tet parade on Sunday. MINDY SCHAUER, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

A thank you

Despite the exclusion of the Partnership of Viet Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Organizations from Sunday's Tet Parade, the group delivered typed thank-you notes in embellished red envelopes to parade-goers.

"We respect your feelings, and also we thank you for respecting our differences," the note said, translated by the group's Phuc Van, 36. The letter wished the reader a prosperous new year, thanked community organizations for supporting the group's inclusion in the parade and noted that members of the group are the community's children, sisters, fathers, etc. The letter also said that violence against the LGBT community has led to suicide in some cases, including 14-year-old David Phan, a Utah teen who was reportedly bullied.

Where there were dark clouds there were also rainbows – lots of them – in the hands of members of a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender group and their supporters.

They waved tiny flags and large flags and held up large metal hearts, each a bright red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple, on the sidelines of the annual Tet parade held Sunday morning in Westminster's Little Saigon neighborhood to celebrate the Vietnamese new year.

The group gathered as spectators because the parade's organizer had barred the Partnership of Viet Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Organizations from walking in the event as it had for the past three years. A court ruling recently upheld the organizer's decision.

Parade-goers lined the route stretching from Magnolia to Bushard streets along Bolsa Avenue, waving to men and women dressed in military fatigues, elected officials riding in the backs of convertibles, rows of martial artists and even mariachis riding on Midway City's entry for its sanitary district.

Luis Grajeda of Garden Grove helped his daughter Vanessa, 5, place a dollar bill in the mouth of one of the costume dragons dancing along the route. He's been bringing his family to the Tet Parade for three years and numerous other parades to introduce his daughters to new cultures.

He said he wouldn't have a problem with the LGBT group participating in the parade.

"I think all the people have the same rights," he said. "Why not."

Thuy Vo Dang, a professor and director of the Vietnamese American Oral History Project at UC Irvine, had been to the parade before, but this year she brought her children – 2-year-old Austen and 6-year-old Allyse – to support the LGBT group.

"I didn't want to miss the opportunity to teach my children about social justice," she said. "There's no one way to be a Vietnamese American."

She said the decision to bar the group was disheartening and regressive since they had successfully fought to be included a few years ago. It also didn't reflect the community's diversity, she said.

Assemblyman Tom Daly, D-Anaheim, and Jose Solorio, vice president of the Rancho Santiago Community College District board of trustees, each got out of the convertibles they were riding in during the parade to greet the LGBT group.

Solorio ultimately let his convertible continue on without him after he joined the group on the sidelines.

"I thought it was important for me to convey a message of inclusiveness and equality," he said afterward. Before the parade, he had said everyone should be able to ring in the new year, regardless of whether the organizers of the event are a public agency or, in this case, a private group.

"Looks pretty public to me," he said of the parade as he walked toward the staging area.

The city of Westminster had funded and organized the parade for years until this year, when city officials said their budget couldn't handle it. A private group of community members – coordinated as the Vietnamese Federation of Southern California – took it on.

And this year when the LGBT group submitted its application to participate in the parade as it had the three years before, the new organizers said no.

Organizers believed the LGBT group's purpose and theme strayed from that of the Tet parade, according to a lawyer representing the Vietnamese Federation of Southern California in a brief filed with the court.

The Union of Vietnamese Student Associations of Southern California, which sponsors the popular Tet Festival, had invited some of the LGBT group's members to march alongside them.

But that act of solidarity didn't occur quite as planned.

Natalie Newton, leader of the LGBT group, said the parade's organizers pressured the students Saturday night to ditch the invitation offered to her LGBT group or risk boycotts of their festival.

The student-sponsored Tet Festival is unaffiliated with the parade, with each backed by separate organizers.

"This kind of bullying, this is not community leadership," Newton said. "We insist that we belong here."

Calls seeking comment from a festival organizer and the student group weren't returned.

Newton said the student group usually has 50 or so people marching with it in the parade, but by the time the student group made its appearance Sunday, there were just a handful.

"I truly believe they were making a statement," Newton said of the small number of marching students. As the students walked by, the LGBT group released clusters of pink balloons with rainbow flags attached.

The group received numerous letters of support from elected leaders as well as the ACLU and legal groups.

Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez, D-Santa Ana, sent a letter saying she wouldn't participate and the Democratic Party of Orange County urged the organizers to reconsider.

With the parade over, Newton said the group would gather all the evidence of support it garnered from the city and elected leaders and take it to Westminster's mayor and city attorney to argue for inclusion in next year's event.

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